All week the Sharks have been positioned to open up some midseason distance between themselves and their closest Pacific Division rivals. All week they've failed.

The latest example came Thursday night at HP Pavilion. If they beat Dallas, the Sharks would have leapfrogged over the Stars into first place. Instead, San Jose lost 4-2 and fell to third place behind Anaheim.

Both teams had been struggling. The Stars were finishing a five-game trip and hadn't won in three tries. The Sharks were coming off an overtime defeat in Anaheim and a loss in Phoenix.

"Especially with a team like that that's been on the road awhile, you just want to squeeze the life out of them and we gave them one," Sharks Coach Ron Wilson said.

San Jose got goals from its top scorers, Milan Michalek and Joe Thornton. But that wasn't enough to beat Dallas, which got two from Mike Modano and one each from Niklas Hagman and Jeff Halpern.

It's no secret that the Sharks have had more success on the road this season than at home, but their series with Dallas takes things to an extreme. Of the six games, San Jose has won all three at the American Airlines Center and the Stars have won all three at HP Pavilion.

In fact, you have to go back to Oct. 27, 2006, for San Jose's last home victory against Dallas as the Stars also won the past three games played here last season.

"It seems like every time we've played them in our building, they've out-waited us and as the game's gone on, we've found a way to shoot ourselves in the foot," Wilson said.

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San Jose started out strong.

The Sharks took a 1-0 lead when defenseman Alexei Semenov came out of the penalty box, carried the puck deep into the Dallas zone and threw a cross-ice pass that forward Curtis Brown fired at Dallas goalie Marty Turco.

Turco made the save, but the rebound went right to Michalek, who scored his team-leading 16th goal at 6:11.

Dallas pulled even at 10:47 of the first period. San Jose captain Patrick Marleau lost a battle for the puck to Stars forward Joel Lundqvist, giving Dallas an odd-man rush with only Semenov back. Hagman beat Sharks goalie Evgeni Nabokov.

Just as the Sharks dominated the first period, Dallas controlled the second.

The Stars took a 2-1 lead at 14:51 when Modano slipped into the slot unnoticed and rifled the puck from behind the net past Nabokov, who didn't have a chance.

The Sharks regained momentum early in the third period when Thornton beat Turco at 3:23 to tie the score at 2-2, but Dallas regained the lead when the rebound of a shot from the blue line caromed to Modano, who got his second goal when his shot beat Nabokov at 12:54.

Halpen finished the scoring at 17:51.

"We still need to have a better effort from all 20 guys." Thornton said. "Dallas is a great team . . . and can win in your building or at home."

Players were hard-pressed to explain the difficulty they have beating Dallas and Anaheim on home ice. The Sharks have fared only slightly better against the Ducks at HP Pavilion this season, taking one point in a Nov. 17 shootout defeat and losing two other games in regulation.

"It's a stat, it's a number," forward Joe Pavelski said. "Sometimes it's good to be aware of them, sometimes you have to forget about that and just go out and play."

More important than where the game is played, some said, is the problem the Sharks can have competing on some nights.

"We just did not do enough to win this hockey game tonight," defenseman Craig Rivet said. "They worked harder and they deserved it."